Tag: Meat Puppets
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Just off the release of Dusty Notes, the Meat Puppets are back on tour with their original drummer Derrick Bostrom for the first time since the mid 90s. Bostrom may be the headline, but let us not bury the lede and forget about Ron Stabinsky. An aficionado on the keys, there was a certain extra energy the Pups were hitting tonight (and on this whole tour, so I hear). Almost as if the usual trip to outerspace wasn’t enough and we have to take this ship into another galaxy. If that’s even something you can fathom.

On a Saturday Night in Jersey City in a venue called Monty Hall, Let’s Make A Deal with the first of many editions of a new thing we’re doing here at Concert Confessions: We call it the Concert Confessions Video Wrap Up. I mean, with all the concert police all over the internet telling people like me to put down their devices at shows I figured this is a good way to let all those people know that I have two middle fingers for them.

Anyhow, below we have a few videos from the show last night. Take a look, a listen and share with your friends!

This was my 20th time seeing the Meat Puppets. Here’s to at least 20 more! Full set list below:

In 1985 label mates at SST Records embarked on the road in what was dubbed “The Tour” and it featured the likes of Husker Du, the Minutemen, Meat Puppets, Saccharine Trust, and SWA. Fast forward to 2017 and we have some of the ol’ gang hitting the road together again as The Meat Puppets have embarked on ‘The Tour Tour Two’ co-headlining dates with Mike Watt (Minutemen) + The Jom & Terry Show. Not only that, but a handful of dates here on the East Coast feature Grant Hart (From Husker Du) as a special guest opener. We’re at the Brooklyn Bowl for this one, which in case you’ve missed it, is a active bowling alley/concert venue hybrid and it’s the best thing to hit Williamsburg since IPA or CitiBike docking stations.

If you’re a fan of unique personalities, I’d like to introduce you to my new close and personal friend Grant Hart. Hanging around the venue incognito before he opened his set at 8PM with a booming Colorado. Real cool dude and as later discovered, nice enough to autograph stuff for fans who asked during the night. His set was about a half hour of glorioussness. You’re the Reflection of The Moon on The Water” is off 2009’s Hot Wax before the token Husker Du track Never Talking To You Again got resounding cheers. Or maybe it was someone rolling a strike at one of the lanes. Those folks seemed jacked to knock over pins with a ball. Two people behind me were talking to each other during the set. Overheard: “This guy, maybe he’s famous? A lot of people watching.” Yeah, he’s famous. As he said after the set “yeah man we worked hard back in the day on all this stuff so people can have our songs as their fucking ringtone.” Fantastic set.

Also, right before ducking off. Grant said something: “Home of the brave, not home of the chicken shit! We gotta do something man. Let’s shut the mother fucker down!” Damn right Grant, damn right. #Resist

Mike Watt has been bringing his Pedro twang to the scene since the 80s. He’s been in so many bands, so many different projects and is integral to every one of them. A set of assorted covers would blast out our eardrums over the next hour.

Tonight Mike Watt is with the Jom & Terry Show, comprised of Tom Watson on guitar and Jerry Trebotic. Need to be good to keep up with the pluckin’ and peddlin’ of Watt and these dudes are up for the task. Portions of the night had me in awe of Tom Watson’s guitar expertise.

Songs were running into each other without pause at times, like the notion of playing 48 songs in 43 minutes wasn’t so far out of the realm. Some songs contained long break downs at the end where Watt would run wild with the bass. Incredible vibes flowing through the Brooklyn Bowl on this night. Right after he said goodnight Mike Watt screamed out “John Coltrane!!!” then put his yellow backpack back on and headed off stage. Perfect.

The Meat Puppets had a little extra kick in their step tonight as they hit the stage at 10:15. Maybe it’s playing with old friends, maybe it’s the vibe of Williamsburg fueling the fire on stage. Legends to put it lightly, this is personally my 19th time seeing the sun scored desert rockers.

That said, it was exciting to hear a couple songs that haven’t been busted out most of those times. When Flaming Heart hit, it was so hard to contain squeals of excitement. They sang the harmonies on the chorus differently than the version found on Too High To Die, more low key. It was delightful.

Sam, Coming Down, Oh Me and Plateau hadpreceded. The Meat Puppets Facebook page had a live video going for the evening’s opener of Sam. How cool is that? And what do the comments read on that video? Well, they critique the abilities of the person taking said live video. The direct reason we can’t have nice things. Sidenote: I envy Cris Kirkwood’s beard.

The last time I saw The Meat Puppets play Severed Goddess Hand live, to my knowledge (fact-checking encouraged) was back in 2008 when they opened for Build To Spill with Dinosaur Jr sandwiched between them. The grainy pictures from my blackberry make me sick to this day. Sick in a different way was yet another gem from one of my favorite records of theirs.

Not exactly the same as the version that Metallica plays, Whiskey In The Jar is always a fun time live.

Mockin’ Bird Hill was the two minute break from the ear-shredding that we all needed. Sweet little diddy and gave everyone a chance to catch their breath. This calm in the air would only last one minute and forty four seconds.

ATTACKED BY MONSTERS!!!!!!!!!! How awesome!? It’s a freaking headbanger full of fuzzy guitar genius. Only time I’ve seen them do it is 2009. This was sick. Upset this isn’t one of the songs they chose to extended jam on, but the night isn’t over.

Up on The Sun had to have clocked in at over 10 minutes. It can’t be said enough about the Meat Puppets. It’s a trip you take. These mid-song space jams, it’s like being elevated into some sort of craft and you return to earth when they come back into the song eventually. They always come back. Curt didn’t pull out the slide til late in the evening. The Brooklyn Bowl got smoked by the old guard of SST tonight. And it was phenomenal.

The last time I walked into the Bowery Ballroom to see the Meat Puppets they went on after 11PM, Shandon was standing atop a part of his drum kit after kicking it over near 1AM as the band was shredding a rare bust out of Attacked By Monsters to close out the night. Tonight, excitement is at new levels as The Meat Puppets are co-headlining this tour with Soul Asylum; basically giving you the chance to see two great bands still rocking out for the price of one. I mean, what else can happen here tonight to make it more awesome? Is Gibby Haynes gonna join the Meat Puppets on stage for a Freddy Fender song? That you’ll have to read on for.

Show is set to kick off shortly after 8-8:15ish. Questions one may ask are: “Well who goes on first?” and “Which band gets to play longer?”. Since the tour is co-headlining, each band is getting roughly 75 mins on stage. Tonight the Meat Puppets played first.

Never ones to stray from starting things with an instrumental jam, tonight’s lead off was Seal Whales. More people in this place than I originally thought. As I was at the merch table bullshitting before showtime didn’t remember THIS many people. Place looked as full as you’re gonna get on a Monday. And it was rocking in there. During Comin’ Down that gave me idea. Head downstairs. Oh, Me was great to get recorded from down there in the first few rows. Then, during Sam I get a tap on the shoulder with a security guard telling me not to take video. Instead of giving him the “it’s 2015” speech I give to all old people I shot back “Yes sir No Video Sir” and headed back upstairs to continue to film.

That’s when things got, well, things got awesome as Gibby Haynes (of course of the Butthole Surfers) was asked to come up and join the band in covering Freddy Fender’s “Wasted Days And Wasted Nights”. It was fun. I’ve got the video below. Wow.

We’re staying down in Texas here for a few as Hey Baby Que Paso preceded Before the Next Teardrop Falls and before you know it Seven Spanish Angels is being rocked out heavy. Bowery Ballroom doesn’t skimp on sound, this place was bumping! Very glad to see that happening.

There was an Up On The Sun a bit earlier in the set and it lasted over 10 mins. It included Cris and Elmo bumping into the speaker and it almost falling over followed by Cris’s best Urkel impression (“Did I do that??). That was some epic shit right there. Curt and Elmo bouncing those spicy riffs back and forth of one another while Cris lays down some, as he called them, direct quote: “Tasty fucking bass licks!”. Quite accurate. And Shandon. Shandon has to watch all this unfold in front of his very eyes and keep up with the Kirkwood Guitar Noise Expo. Anyone who can drum in this band is someone of serious talent. Killin’ it back there.

Finished up strong with Backwater followed by the Sloop John B into Lake of Fire set the building on fire show closer. These dudes kill it every time they come around, no surprises here to witness this. Just wish they’d play these slightly larger type venues more often than places like Mercury Lounge where every picture is pitch black. Oh yeah, and Soul Asylum is up next!

Somewhere after 9:30 Soul Asylum hit the stage and Dave Pirner had on an Aquaman shirt. File that under “Hashtag: Rad”. These dudes are way more than just Runaway Train, and this being my third time seeing this band I can say that they’ve proved that with every set. Somebody To Shove brought the crowd back to life from it’s short intermission real quick. Shut Down preceeded two personal favorites of mine, Just Like Anyone and Misery. Such a tight band these dudes are.

The dude writing this isn’t surprised that Dave Pirner owns a grammy. Dave has a great rock voice and a above par songwriter too. I mean every song seems like it could be in the soundtrack of movie. And sometimes they are as the case with Misery.

Sometimes they’re not. Whatcha Need was up next before Black Gold, another one I had to tape. Band rocked quite a few more tracks awesome tunes. Without A Trace, The Game, Can’t Help It were songs I just took in. I had a seat so I leaned back, had a great view of this awesome scene. Thinking back of my shitty weekend and thinking about how I wasn’t thinking about it at all. That’s what this whole thing is about. Tonight was the first night I felt normal again in a while.

A few more were in were in the tank before things wind down. Supersonic, which isn’t an Oasis cover (That might be a little too 1994 at that point) but actually, I believe it’s a new track off the forthcoming record. It’s a rocker. Eyes of A Child was the last man standing before this place was about to burst wide open for, quite frankly, one of the best Rock & Roll songs ever to exist.

Runaway Train. And I’m back to recording. I need to get one with good sound, the previous times I saw the vocals on my video didn’t sound so hot. Well thank you Bowery Ballroom because everything sounds great to me at 5AM here after the show watching the video. When Pirner plucks those final bars on that song it sounded like magic. This night was just too insane. Spinnin’ , Gravity,Made To Be Broken were heavy jams before the biggest of them all, April Fool closed that son’bitch down.

Check this tour out. It’s coming out west where Concert Confessions Headquarters is based out of. I know we got lots of readers from the best coast. Head to TheMeatPuppets.Com/Tour and keep up to date. So many smiles leaving Bowery Ballroom. Such satisfaction.

Ladies and Gentleman welcome to one of the newer venues to hit the Tri-state area: Rough Trade Records in Williamsburg.

And here I thought we were headed to some basement shack with 6 foot ceilings and a stack of 50 records that the band stands on and plays. Absolutely not. New York City now has it’s Amoeba, it’s Vintage Vinyl . If only the stage was located inside this extremely well lit, supermarket style record store but alas, open a door in the back and find yourself a real life rock venue. Long bar running along the left side with a very roomy standing room section and a 2nd floor wrapping around up top. Towards the end of the night I found myself thinking I would have been more comfortable had I opted for downstairs, but when given the chance I always get as high as I can. Heck, this place would be an awesome venue if it wasn’t in a record store! Also awesome that it’s owned by Bowery Presents (as opposed to Livenation). This fact was apparent when I found myself being treated like a human being by event staffers. Interesting.

At 9:20 Cass McCombs took the stage with his band to kick this night off. On tour with the Meat Puppets, one thing that can be promised is that they’re going to bring the weird. And that’s exactly what they did playing over an hour of jams, both slow folky and wild crazy tunes melded perfectly to thaw out the chilly Brooklyn crowd. Was making my way around the venue for the perfect spot during the set. Felt like every corner I enter these dudes were exploring a new sound, extending another song into the Halloween night. With 10:30 coming up, it’s only normal to look at your phone and wonder how many songs are left. (This writer has a LONG trip home!) Then Cass tells Rough Trade that this is there last song and broke into… The Unforgiven! Place went nuts. Where’d this come from? I’ve got video of most of the song below. The videos tonight will be a recurring theme of me trying to compensate for yet another dimly lit venue. At least from up top anyway. Cass McCombs headlines Rough Trade November 1st and is currently on tour with the Meat Puppets. Check them out.

Almost 11 and here come The almighty Meat Puppets starting the night with the familiar instrumental Seal Whales. A fierce Coming’ Down preceded The Monkey and The Snake before Plateau and Touchdown King got the place jumping.

Touchdown King isn’t even my ‘go-to’ Meat Puppets track but every time I’ve seen them do it, in the double digit amount of times they’ve always had some new wrinkle to add in. It’s gone way longer than the 5 1/2 minutes it went tonight but the Halloween 2014 edition is one for the ages.

Then, premiered in St. Louis a few shows back, it was time for us to get Seven Spanish Angels live. A Willie Nelson/Ray Charles cover, it’s a new addition to the set list. And it’s incredible.

Oh, Me brought the room more alive than ever and tonight’s epic Up On The Sun (the video above being the only video in these set that wasn’t shot by yours truly) kicked things into an even higher gear. Then Confusion Fog was busted out?! You guys trying to make me wet myself up here?

See the Meat Puppets have a set of songs that they will play written down on a sheet of paper throughout a tour, but they don’t play all of them on a said night. Confusion Fog is always on there, but if I’ve seen it live before it hasn’t been for a while. I let out a “Oh shit Confusion Fog?!” as it began. Awesome sauce.

I just got an idea and I’ll do this completely for free. We need a music video to accompany the greatness that is Waiting-really one of the stand out tracks from Rat Farm (they all stand out, but that’s the one Jambase likes). Someone needs to take video of me during the day waiting on tables (living the dream of serving food) and cut it up and make a Waiting music video. Or you can click play above. Either one works.

Cathy’s Clown when straight into Lake Of Fire tonight. Cathy’s Clown serves as the B-Side to the Meat Puppets split 7 in w/ Cass McCombs, the A-Side being Hey Baby Que Paso (which we got earlier during an unplanned emptying of the bladder) and Elmo sings lead vocals on it. Both live and on the record. Rad. Elmo, shreds far left on stage sporting his new Jack White-esque hair do. Folks chanted his name all night. After Lake Of Fire it was Sloop John B to close out the night. It’s a good going home song, as the chorus is “I wanna go home”.

The boys came back out as we’re nearing 1Am here. Aurora Borealis! Our third instrumental jam of the evening. With guitar tones like these, who ever really needs words?

For folks wondering where Backwater is never fear, it was up next and ended my Halloween at Rough Trade Records.

I have been going to concerts since 1996 when I was 13, somehow I have missed seeing the Meat Puppets despite a few chances to do so. Sadly after this evening of blistering loud rock and roll I was kicking myself the entire 50 minute ride home. I was thankful to be able to go to this show, things have been a little tight as of late but I got a offer I couldn’t refuse. So off I went to the beautiful Delmar Loop, home of the famous Blueberry Hill.

The Duck Room is a midsize venue located in the Blueberry Hill’s basement, it host a monthly show by Chuck Berry that draws people from all over the world. The Duck Room has a great sound and a great feel to it, a bar in the back of the room and ducks that line the walls, hence the name. I got their about 10 minutes past showtime thanks to a last minute delay and a gas stop. Cass McComb was on stage when I got their playing their second song of the set. They sounded great and are from the Bay Area of California.

They are a four piece band and they had the crowd feeling the good vibes of their laid back rock style. Beers were drank and great times were had out in audience. Loud cheers and whistles filled the song breaks, safe to say the crowd enjoyed them.

I have a deep love for the slide guitar and I was super happy when I saw their guitar player Buddy switch it up and tore down the Duck electric slide style. It was incredible sounding and was a highlight of their set for me as I really love that instrument and Buddy rocked it.

After 40 Minutes of great tunes and rocking the Duck, Cass McComb said goodnight and left the stage for the band of the evening. The good humored sound engineer came out and exchange a few jokes and words with the fans up front. As most people found the bar I found my way up to the front of the stage for a show I was growing more excited for by the minute.

After a very brief intermission the legendary Meat Puppets came on stage, plugged in and got to work.

This show was LOUD, I have heard people say that before but these guys were turned up to 12, one higher than 11.

After 3 or 4 songs they decided to give the crowd a few Acoustic jams the song ” Seven Spanish Angels ” sounded amazing and was well received by the appreciative crowd.

These guys were really connected to each other and kept looking back at the others as to say, should we keep this jam rolling. It was almost like they each were challenging each other to set the bar a bit higher which resulted in a incredible performances.

Curt Kirkwood is a god on the guitar, I had no clue. He made sounds come out of his guitar that I did not know were possible prior to this night.

The Meat Puppets spent over 70 minutes rocking the house, The Meat Puppets took the shortest intermission I have ever witnessed. A mere 2 minutes at most and they were back for more.

After rocking a 2 column set list it was time to cal it a night. It was past 1 in the morning when I ventured back outside in the cold St. Louis night to my car. My ears ringing with that wonderful feeling that only comes from seeing a kick ass show. I went home, ate pizza drank a few beers and crashed. Super thankful I did not pass this one up.

Meat Puppets are on tour right now through December go see them live at a show near you. P.s bring ear plugs.

Hanging with folks this week who have fond memories of the Meat Puppets opening for Ween at Red Rocks some years back. So of course the amazing Red Rocks Amphitheater was part of the day’s sight seeing tour, along with a walk on campus at University of Colorado where I sat in on a Psych class for no reason whatsoever. Tonight we’re in Boulder at The Fox Theater, and it’s a tad later show. Doors at 8:30.

Moistboyz at 9 and the Meat Puppets at 11 tonight. This co-headlining bill makes it easy to see a show on back to back nights, see what songs which band feels don’t make the cut for their longer sets. Last night felt like the bands split time, and both sets were almost equal in length. Seems that it will be the case again tonight. Doors opened at 8:30 and show started promptly at 9.

Guy, Micky and the gang take the stage at 9 and kick tonight off with “U Blow”. Loud as ever. Second night in Colorado, second straight packed out house for both bands. Usually takes a few minutes for the stragglers to head inside, but 8:30 doors had a cluster under the marquee regardless. Several fans walking up to merch asking for Moistboyz vinyl pre “V”.

No second floor tonight, but side balconys galore here in the Rocky Mountains. As mentioned yesterday, everyone in this crowd knows all these songs. Guy let’s a little country twang fly on “Down on the Farm”, which with ” The Tweaker” are now up there in Moistboyz tracks that I’ll be humming for days. Plus tonight we got “1.0 (Fuck No)” which is another hard rocking head nodder. I couldn’t figure out what the crowd was chanting during the chorus but the building was sizzling at this point and it’s currently snowing outside. Guy mentioned they had to throw a song called “My War” off the record “when we realized Black Flag had a song by that name”.

More talkative tonight as Mickey tells the crowd that they’re are “great looking” tonight. Never retire Mick, never retire. Speaking of Micky, he’s back at again shredding with the sheer grittiness that only the Deaner can provide. Damn did I wish they threw a Ween song or two in here. I know they’re not trying to be that, but it could have been cool. How bout an impromptu jam session between the Kirkwoods and Deaner? Another time I’m in the same room with these dudes and they don’t blow minds with a jam. Maybe they’ll save something special for the show closer in Minneapolis. I bet no one will record it. Sad face emoticon.

Learn the songs by heart or don’t know a damn note and you’re still gonna have a good time at this live show. I wish I could move to a town where everyone is into good music, I can get very used to this. Moistboyz were off the stage a tad after 10PM.

Moistboyz partial probably not correctly ordered setlist: U Blow, The Fury, The Spike,Captain America, My War, 1.0 (Fuck No), Down on the Farm, The Tweaker Black train, Paperboy, I am The Reaper, Valley of the Sun, Keep the Fire Alive, Good Morning America.

Not due on stage until 11PM, color me impressed when the boys came out at 10:40 to start slaying tonight’s headlining set. Interested to see what songs we get tonight that we didn’t have the privilege of experiencing last night. Also get the extended jams tonight on Plateau and Touchdown King, with a curfew of 1:30 they could pretty much play every song in the damn catalog.

Our first non repeat of the two nights came “Sometimes Blue” which followed it’s Rat Farm partner track “Waiting”. Also good to mix in “Lost” because I was across the street earlier in the day in a record store and Lost had gotten in my head from over the stores PA. It was almost perfect that it happened.

Also, last night we didn’t get a “Backwater”, which I did not even realized happened until it was heard tonight.

Towards midnight “Open Wide” was busted out. I always think Open Wide is Attacked By Monsters with its first riff or so.

Set seemed to move along so fast, here we were coming up to the finish line with “Sloop John B”. It’s easy to get lost in time when witnessing the Meat Puppets live, sometimes they delve deep into a jammy part of a song that makes you feel like you’ve been taken off the earth and taken to outer space for the duration of songs. It’s part of the magic that is this band. Part of the magic that makes people like me come back for the 15th time. 16 can’t come soon enough.

Meat Puppets setlist:

I’m a Mindless Idiot*
Touchdown
Plateau
Coming down
Up On The Sun
The monkey and the snake
Oh, Me
Sam
Waiting
Sometimes Blue
Hey baby Que Paso
Wasted days and Wasted nights
Lost
Seal Whales*
Backwater
Sloop john B
Lake of fire
Open Wide
Cathy’s Clown

*I’m notorious for mixing up these instrumental jams seeing them performed live so these two might be flip flopped.

Exactly one year after taking a road trip down to Pennsylvania to catch The Meat Puppets in Ween Country for two nights, tonight we kick off another double dip of the Meat Puppets, this time with The Moistboyz in the great state of Colorado. Always a good time when you could get me off the east coast. Last time I crossed time zones was Soundgraden at The Gorge Amphitheater in Washington in 2011. Now it’s Denver’s turn to have me inside of them tonight. Good thing about the back to back shows is the Meat Puppets are opening up Denver and Moistboyz open up tomorrow night in Boulder as it is a “co-headlining” bill.

Before hitting the Gothic Theater for the 7PM doors it was about time we explored this “Weed is for sale in stores thing”. It’s the most surreal thing in the world. On South Broadway in Englewood where the Gothic is, there’s a 10 mile stretch that must have at least 30 recreational weed stores, all named with lame marijuana puns. So with Deathstar in tow we were off to the theater. Inside is real nice with these sort of levels on the floor section allowed different sight lines for those of us who struggle with height. And a balcony wrapping around the 2nd floor. Before I knew it showtime was upon us.

The Meat Puppets graced the stage at 8PM with the token instrumental jam “I’m a Mindless idiot” opener followed by a thunderous “Touchdown King”.

“Plateau” and “Coming Down” (you know, mountain themes ) preceded a nine minute version of “Up on the Sun” that truly meant business. I guess they’re not mailing it in just because they’re opening.

Other highlights from the hour and 15 minutes the kings of the desert include “Wasted Days and Wasted Nights” while Elmo Kirkwood, not uncommon to his live show experiences, lights up pot on stage and proceeds to blow clouds of smoke in the air. “Waiting” was the only Rat Farm track played tonight as things closed with the two headed monster of “Sloop John B” and “Lake of Fire”

followed by “Cathy’s Clown”, which is now two straight gigs where I’ve seen them close with it. They played up until 9:15.

Tons of beer on stage for Moistboyz who are due up at 9:30. It’s a pretty Moistboyz heavy crowd for tonight’s split bill, tons of Ween shirts. Those fans travel. After smoking a cigarette I walked back to my spot down front to hear the Moistboyz tuning slightly before 10. If you’ve never seen these guys live, I’m gonna let you in on a little secret: Guy Heller is insane.

Literally. The best kind of insane. Screaming the lyrics to tonight’s first track, I Am The Reaper, these guys spent the next hour or so lighting up the crowd with a career spanning set that set off slam dances, moshing and just plain fun from a handful of dudes who know what it is to have a sense of humor.

Oh shit, that’s Nick Oliveri from Queens of the Stone Age on bass. Sick. Rocking the Scott Ian beard standing between Guy and Deaner, I slid my way in front of the guard rail to take some awesome shots. These guys rock HARD. With every passing song seeming more pleasing than the last according to roars, by the time they were halfway through Captain America I looked around almost in disbelief. There’s this many die hard Moistboyz fans ?

Full disclosure: the dude writing this loved Ween and still thinks it was a dick move in how the band was broken up. That said, this isn’t Ween. And that’s not at all a bad thing. It’s a completely different animal. A wild, loud beast.

Deaner is just flat out torturing his guitar. He is a guy who can’t just not be in a band, one of those special kind of guitar players who can’t be wasted sitting on a shelf at home. I mentioned Guy. He’s shirtless, he’s playing air guitar next to Dean and Steve, he’s singing to the drummer at one point, actually sang one song sitting down. Steve Hass is killing it too, the guitar player not named Dean in tonight’s equation.

As much as I tried to brush up on these tracks, a lot of them didn’t stick til tonight when I got to witness them live. And now, days later jotting this down, lots of those songs are still in my head. I knew Paperboy from the Record Store Day single a year ago, Nick sang the lyrics to that one. In The Valley Of The Sun just has this bad ass riff continuously through it. They even jam hard.

What an evening for the ages. And good thing is I get to do this again tomorrow night. Moistboyz setlist below (I took a picture of it)

Moistboyz Setlist:

I Am The Reaper
U Blow
The Fury
High and Mighty
The Spike
Captain America
That’s What Rock and Roll Can Do
Medusa
Black Train
Down on the Farm
Paperboy
My War
The Tweaker
Crisis and Vices
Valley Of The Sun
Good Morning America
Keep The Fire Alive

You know what they say, 13th time is a charm right? This is going to be a great one, The Meat Puppets are back in New York tonight! At the Brooklyn Bowl no less, in the hipster capital of the world known as Williamsburg. How could you not love the Brooklyn Bowl? If I had any money I’d have dinner, the menu looks amazing. It’s a bowling alley, and people do bowl during the duration of the show. It’s kinda neat, like between your turns you can rock out to awesome music. Spent a good portion of my 6 o clock hour lost in this town, because even if you give me the smartest phone in the world I can still find ways not to follow directions and follow my own wrong instincts. Didn’t get to the Brooklyn Bowl til about 645, 45 minutes after doors opened, and settled in on a couch.. near an outlet. On the lookout for any Meat Puppets walking by.

Enemy Planes hit the stage at 8:35. Would you call this “groovy”? These guys got into jams I can’t even explain which way is up. It appears as if my iPhone isn’t the only apple product in use here tonight at the Brooklyn Bowl, as there are MacBooks all over the stage. A dude playing slide guitar, just because. I kept thinking that I’ve seen this lead singer before, where have I seen him. Then I figured it out. This is where Jesse Pinkman drove his car off to in the Breaking Bad series finale! He does look like Pinkman. They captured the room, had a bunch of people up front extremely interested in the goings on. I was checking out the rest of the room make sure it filled out, which it did to an extent. Enemy Planes went off at 9:09.

Meat Puppets pushing it close to 10, and there’s another show on after this with doors to that opening at 11:30. About 10 to 10 it was time to party. Kirkwood, Kirkwood, Kirkwood and Sahm.. The Meat Puppets.

In April, I remember mixing up the names of I’m A Mindless Idiot and Seal Whales. They’re both extended instrumental jams, and there was no confusion tonight as this mindless idiot was rolling film. The thing about this tour is the lack of video appearing on YouTube from it. I’ve made a conscience decision to change that.

Monkey and the Snake and Touchdown King brought the fierceness before jumping into a Plateau/ComingDown back to backer.

That Plateau was nothing short of fucking majestic and Coming Down seemed, if it could be, a little extra twangy tonight. Went for the shortened version of Up On The Sun tonight, it was ONLY TEN MINUTES long!

Curt pulled out the slide early tonight, early and often.

First Rat Farm tracks tonight: Sometimes Blue and Waiting rocked the Bowling Alley into nothing but a sea of bobbing heads. Waiting is so Byrds-y, then you just sing the lyrics along to yourself and realize how far a songwriter the man to the far left of our room,

Curt Kirkwood, has evolved to over the course of the last 30 years. Then it was time for Sam, a song that I recall Marc Maron asking Curt about on his WTF podcast last week. How is Shandon not busting open his drum kit back there? He’s killin’ it as usual.

Sam was speedy as ever, serving as a great prelude to the Lost that would follow.

Time for some Oh, Me action. I knew it was coming after Lost, didn’t need to see Curt mouth it to the band to have the feel of the set.

Speaking of feels of the set, I set myself up right in front of the stage to the far right anticipating Curt to be there but he and Cris switched sides! They’re usually on opposite sides, the 12 other times I’ve seen them anyway. I’m standing right in front of Cris, who is a master of jumping around stage hitting the bass like a beast. And Elmo is sandwiched between Father and Uncle, front and center. Destroying it. Broke a string or two by night’s end. This kid shreds harder and better every time I see these dudes. Especially on Seal Whales, which came right after

Time and Money, another solid Rat Farm track.

Now we’re diving right into a groovy Backwater as it seems we are creeping to the end of this evening. During Sloop John B next I wrote it down along with writing down Lake of Fire.. Because Lake of Fire always comes next, right? Thirteenth time seeing these guys and they still can throw curve balls- Open Wide came next. A very surprised reaction not unlike the one I felt in April at Mercury Lounge, I let off a loud “oh shit!!” As I focused in with my new toy on the video, my iPhone 5C. Awesome amphibious times.

Now the opening chords of Cathy’s Clown begin, as the band is being told that that’s it. Elmo, who doesn’t look thrilled about having to compromise the Everly Brothers classic, makes sure to extend a jam in the middle of it,

making sure the thing clocked in over seven minutes. There was some serious headiness here, Curt and Elmo just bounced riffs off of one another for what seemed like forever. You’d have to keep reminding yourself “Holy shit this is still Cathy’s Clown!”. Then, assuming we’re just here to piss off the people who make the rules, Shandon slams the skins not once, not twice, but four knocks right into Lake of Fire. The phrase ‘crowd goes wild’ couldn’t be more appropriate here. And all puns that involve Lake Of Fire and the song ‘burned’ down the house (you know, because of the fire) cannot be brushed aside as usual cliche.

The Meat Puppets bowl a 300 at Brooklyn Bowl. That set was just perfect.

The Meat Puppets recently released their 14th studio album, Rat Farm in April. This cruised through the east coast, destroying cities like Lancaster, New Hope and New York City just to name the ones we covered for you. The band just played Primavera Sound Festival in Barcelona and as rumblings of a fall west coast swing fill the grapevine, we can officially report at least 10 shows happening in middle America this July. For all the announced dates scroll down below, or feel free to check out the bands Official Website Here for more information.

Back to places familiar to this guy as the Meat Puppets graced the Mercury Lounge tonight completing a back to back stint in New York City. If you’ve been following us here at Concert Confessions, you’ve read the documented tales of the band ripping through Lancaster and New Hope. Who would have thought that those shows wouldn’t have even began to prepare me on what was going to take place here tonight at 217 E Houston Street. It’s the late show, so doors are at 9:30 with The World Takes taking the stage at 10. Spotted Shandon outside, we discussed the KISS mural being removed from the wall on the bar across the street. I’m from here and I hadn’t noticed it.

Was heading in to check out some of The World Takes set when suddenly a vinyl mix up ended up in me keeping an eye on the merch table for a little while and act like a big shot. That was fun, because the people who come to the merch table are the people I really wanna talk to-the people who are really as into the Pups as I am. Anyone who saw me there with the “Your Favorite Band Sucks” hoodie on please I want you to be my friend. Especially that bartender who wanted to grab her shirt before it got crazy in there. The World Takes are headed upstate too, so make sure you check them out. I enjoyed them all three nights even if two of them were from the merch table they can rock it. And if you don’t trust me, ask DJ Bonebreak.

At about 10 after 11, The Meat Puppets hit the stage to a resounding cheer from the New York scum rockers like myself. Began their set with two sweet tunes off Rat Farm, the new record that comes out this month, Waiting and Sometimes Blue. All of these songs I’m getting to hear from the Rat Farm are so impressive, I can’t wait to get a hold of that thing. The Monkey And The Snake followed and before the night had began I decided that tonight was gonna be a night to focus on getting some video, and I did so by getting 15 songs taped.

Oh, Me batting clean up tonight. The shredding exhibitions that Curt is displaying with his six string are extra bitchin’. I mean after all it is late night in the Lower East Side, how could you do anything else besides tear that place to pieces.

Touchdown King then an 8 minute Up On The Sun got the crowd really going. Place went nuts when they came back to the meat of the song.

After some Wasted Days and Wasted Nights and Hey Baby Que Paso action, the band swam into Seal Whales I’m a Mindless Idiot (Had my page misnumbered). Funny moment during the song (as seen in the video at 2:25 and then 2:49) when Curt reaches for his slide and can’t find it. Then asks for help finding it from Danny “Moped” (Roadie/Awesome dude) on the mic by humorously saying “Come on Moped.. you fucking pothead get my slide”. I saw Danny head up there, and it looked as if it turned out to already be on the stage.

The title track from Rat Farm is freaking incredible. That “Rotten To The Core” line in the chorus is forever in my head, and the exploding beginning chords along with the verse being all aloha, it’s cheery at times and then gets angry. I like bipolar songs. Also, we’ve actually got some conversing on stage wit the band and the crowd. They looked like they were having tons of fun tonight

Another newbie, Time And Money preceeded Tennessee Stud. Then, next up was the live debut of “Original One” which SPIN has streaming as of today.

I broke the news about the stream to Shandon and Cris before the show, so I’m not saying I was the reason for them playing it, but I sure as hell would like to think I am.

Open Wide!! I screamed so damn loud. What an amazing tune that we didn’t get the previous two nights. I mean, it’s lyrics like “Seventeen fat ripe rats hold stacks of juniper pie aloft” that make you wonder if the band is actually from this planet. Like, what the hell does that even mean? And how do you guys make it sound so awesome?

The first few times witnessing Sloop John B it live didn’t move me the way it’s moved me the past couple of nights. It’s the “hug your friend and sway back and forth gently ” song before you start jumping up and down when Lake Of Fire storms in next and wrecks all those feelings of meditated joy.

This band is the best mind fuck in the world. And I guess somewhere during the set they decided to not do it encore style, and instead just play through all their songs and not have to come back and forth. I’m A Mindless IdiotSeal Whales (Again, paged misnumbered) jammed hard for a good few minutes, then Backwater ended my three night stint with the Meat Puppets.

It’s damn shame I’m not getting to see this band tomorrow night. You Ithaca folks are lucky, enjoy yourselves.

We’re gonna put this in the first 25 words because it’s that important: John and Peters in New Hope is the most amazing place in the world! This little place on a little street in a little town, the perfect way to dive into our 2nd night of seeing the Meat Puppets. It’s this tiny bar with a sliding door leading 3 steps down to the basement in the back with low ceilings. When I say low ceilings I mean 7 or 8 feet high. You know what it felt like? It had the feel of a teenage party where one of your friends parents goes out of town and everyone runs a muck-only there’s also booths, like a diner, all around the room and they have awesome food.. This makes Mercury Lounge look huge. Sign on the front door says “Smoking Permitted”. How amazing is that? Almost as amazing as Mickey Melchiondo, better known as Dean Ween(!!!!!) hanging with the band as I watched the merch get set up. You might ask what would Dean Ween, Cris and Curt Kirkwood be talking about. What else? TROUT of course! There’s a sweet river a few blocks from this place that separates Pennsylvania and New Jersey. City folk like myself don’t usually see cool looking land and stuff, so I’m trippin’ on the architecture of this town and this place even before the show. Speaking of shows, this one starts at 9:30 , so much time to be spent in this cloud of smoke taking in a night of Meat Puppets.

It feels weird to smoke inside. I’m not at all used to this as The World Takes walked into the building a tad after 9(they’re from here, well 2 of them) and started tuning their stuff. The set list is within view, but the chords are over the words so I can’t make it out. But I do know when they started rocking, I was into those first two cuts heavily. Besides looking kinda like Curt, which was made evident at last nights merch table where at least 5 people asked him to sign Meat Puppets CD’s, the guitar player/lead singer Steve really takes some queues from a Curt Kirkwood style of guitar playing. It can get really spacey at times. If they play a bigger place on this tour, maybe he’ll come up and jam with the boys during their set. That’d be cool. This place is packed to the gills with every one of these booths filled, with waitress service no less bringing pitches of beer back and forth through a crowd with barely any standing room. I settled for a spot by the girls bathroom after all was said and done. Sound in here is awesome, I hear the vocals surrounding me.

At around 10:05 or so The Meat Puppets trotted downstairs onto, well, I guess we’re calling it a stage. The show was not to go on without a hitch however, as somehow in the mix of things some beer got spilled all over Curt’s peddle board. Such a tiny place, everyone crowded everywhere you could see how that could happen. He messed with it for a little while and eventually got it to a point that he was alright with, and “The Monkey and the Snake” ( along with “Touchdown King” and the sweet new track “Waiting”)

kicked us off for the 2nd night in the row. Everything with the guitar sounds sounded awesome to me, but I’m no musician after all. Change up thrown when Up On The Sun makes an appearance in the 4th slot tonight and Plateau followed.

Tonight is the night of the extended jams. Check that, tonight is the night for super extended jams. Up On The Sun drifted to a far off land for a while there, and then it came back to earth and blew our freaking minds. You know what else I notice on the steps on the side of the stage? Dean Ween with his eyes closed, head nodding drifting off to this far away place Up On The Sun with us. He’s one of our peers tonight. Of course, in the back of my mind all night was “maybe they’ll jam”. I’ll save the suspense, that did not happen.

We got our “Wasted Days and Wasted Nights” and “Hey Baby Que Paso” fix tonight, and I’ve figured out the names of those songs from last night that I didn’t catch. Elmo took the lead vocal duties again tonight, and the song is “Cathy’s Clown”, an Everly Brothers cover.

That was hilarious, I love this freaking band. After the song Elmo states: “I wrote that earlier”. The title track from the new record “Rat Farm” is glorious as hell if I may say so myself. “Time and Money” was played last night, although I noticed Curt shaking off Shandon when he suggested it tonight. In the bar earlier in the evening, I overheard them at sound check playing “Down”, but that didn’t appear tonight or last night.

Sloop John B, Lake Of Fire and Backwater before they said goodnight and ducked up the stairs. No idea what time it is as my phone was dead hours ago. I don’t know this place, maybe they don’t have encores. But none of us cared, as a Meat Puppets chant grew strong with us in the crowd and pounding on the fragile ceiling went along with it. Eventually, they came back down and we showered them with cheers. For a small place that can’t fit many more people we got loud. Remember that “super extended jams” line? I wouldn’t have even brought that into the mix if it wasn’t for this encore. “I’m A Mindless Idiot” and “Lost” had to combine for close to 20 minutes at least. These guys are like their own video game, these sounds are coming from guitars? Then “Oh, Me” began and the place erupted again. Deaner has moved to the right side of the ‘stage’ now, passed me by on his way there and I made sure to touch him.

Again, who knows what time it was when they went off, but I know this much. Most of these folks stuck around to just reflect on this epic evening of events. I was talking to so many fans like just like me, about so many different shows. Like the girl who came all the way down from Vermont. That makes my trip from New York look like small potatoes now. Whatever size vegetable, this trip to Pennsylvania for two nights has been amazing. Now the band will spend the next two nights in my town. How great is life?

Opening Day. Fresh cut grass, blue skies and Baseball. It is indeed the foundation of America. Today is a different kind of Opening Day for this guy, as it’s the first of four consecutive nights to be spent with my desert punk legend buddies, The Meat Puppets. They’ve got a new record coming out, Rat Farm, this month and all reports are that the first few shows of this Rat Farm tour have been kicking ass. Tonight we’re in Lancaster-somehow stars aligned and my good friend Linda was able to pick me up for a little road trip into Pennsylvania to catch the band twice before the back to back at the Mercury Lounge in New York City the 3rd and the 4th. So with a bag packed and a pocket full of dreams, and not a dollar to my name we got in that rental car and hit the road.

The Chameleon Club sneaks up on you, as it appears to be your regular run of the mill street when suddenly appears a club across the street from a parking lot. Really old school feel. I’m from city where everything is extravagant, its cool to settle into a grass roots looking kinda joint in the middle of somewhat no where to take in some awesome music.

The World Takes hit the stage at 8:15, I could hear them from the back of the room. The guitars got really funky at times, their second or third song had a pretty awesome solo, and the next song sounded like some early Meat Puppets on speed. Twangy at times, straight forward at other points, the World Takes far from sucked. Did you know their drummer is DJ Bonebreak from ‘X‘? How cool is that? Throughout their set the songs sounded more and more like a mixture of the Pups and like, Pavement with more added twang. At one point scouting spots, I ended up downstairs and there was some dude doing stand up comedy in this dank sidebar part of the club. Lots of stuff happening in Lancaster, if I wasn’t here on business, I’d go tell a few jokes. The World Takes played til a few minutes before 9. They’ll be on the next four dates at least, so show up early and check them out.

At 9:17 with the whistling of “The Monkey and The Snake” we were off and running with this evenings proceedings. During Touchdown King, I headed my way upstairs, trying to explore every corner of this place. I got there I was along the rail overlooking the band almost from above/behind them, and by the time I settled in, we’re already getting our first taste from Rat Farm. Before the set, Shandon said that they’d try to squeeze in four tracks from the new album. That’s entirely possible because 3rd song in I see Curt say “Waiting” to Shan. Ah ha, but I recall the trusty article on AQ that gave me the list of tracks, and can recall that Waiting was one of those new ones. That was followed by “Sometimes Blue”, also off Rat Farm. From this angle you can really appreciate Shandon’s drumming expertise.

Band has a different energy tonight. Ripping through the “Oh, Me”, “Coming Down” and “Plateau” ferociously before hitting us with the double dip of Sahm action: “Wasted Days And Wasted Nights” and “Hey Baby Que Paso”.

That Wasted Days is some real groovy stuff man, always finding that being the song I hum during the writing of these things.

Elmo, shredding behind Cris throughout the evening, rounding out the craziness that is this band was thrust upon the mic with his turn to take his crack at the vocal duties, helping out Curt on a song that the name is escaping me. Wonder if they’ll ever get a 3rd mic up there. Out of that song, and the next two at least one of them had to be new considering those were the only three I couldn’t name all night.

After that section, it was time for Sloop John B straight into the always blistering Lake Of Fire. Then they ducked off stage.

Figure this gave me time to run back downstairs (as you can see from the pics/videos, I’m not in stand still mode tonight whatsoever). I come out of the staircase literally 14 seconds after they went off they were back on ready to kick it encore style. I’m A Mindless Idiot jammed us into Backwater. That was the last song of the evening.

Nothing left to do but hang out by the merch table waiting for the boys to come out and congratulate them on a their victory here this evening in Lancaster. And there was this chick with purple hair waiting to have a pic taken with the band and I could not take my eyes of this chick. So purple hair Lancaster girl, if you read this, you have an admirer from New York.

This Spring, the Meat Puppets will release their 14th studio album: Rat Farm. Not only bringing us the joy of new music in 2013, but the band will also bring us the gift of live music as they’ll be hitting the road in the US this March and April. The only major city hit is New York City with the Mercury Lounge getting a back to back. We’ll have the full coverage of those two shows without a doubt. To see if they’re coming within distance of you, just scroll through the dates listed below.

Read about our very own Reverend Justito’s night w/ the Meat Puppets in Santa Monica back in October, click here.

Meat Puppets 2013 Spring US Tour Dates:

March 28 //Voo Doo Lounge Shreveport, LA

March 29 // Bottle Tree Birmingham ALA

March 30 // 40 Watt. Athens, GA

April 1 // Jewish Mother, Virginia Beach, VA

Virginia Beach Date has been moved to Lancaster PA on April 1st.

April 1 // The Chameleon, Lancaster PA

April 2 // John and Peter’s Place, New Hope PA

April 3 // Mercury Lounge NYC (Early Show: Doors 6:30PM)

April 4 // Mercury Lounge NYC (Late Show: Doors 9:30PM)

April 5 // The Haunt Ithaca, NY

April 6 // The Club At Water Street Rochester, NY

April 7 // Skullys, Columbus

April 9 // The Bishop, Bloomington, IN

April 10 // Cosmic Charlies, Lexington, KY

April 11 // High Watt, Nashville, TN

April 12 // JJ’s Bohemia, Chattanooga, TN

April 13 // Martin’s, Jackson MI

For more information you can head to TheMeatPuppets.Com and hit up the tour section of their website. Follow the band on Twitter ‘@TheMeatPuppets’ for updates by the minute.

It was a little over three years ago when I moved from West Hollywood to Santa Monica. Sure the temperature in this part of town is a bit lower but so are the number of quality live performances. So you can imagine my delight when our resident Meat Puppets groupie Jay Porks kicked down the knowledge that his favorite band was coming to town.

I had never heard of Track 16 before this show and as it turns out that is a damn shame. On this particular night the art gallery/music venue was hosting its final show as it is set to be torn down under eminent domain laws so we can finally have Metro Rail reach from Downtown Los Angeles to the Pacific Ocean. Tucked across the street from the local Hazardous Material drop off, I knew I was in for an interesting night when I entered the parking lot and saw some individuals who were no doubt alive for the original Woodstock Music Festival taking hits from a rather large bong.

I walked into the venue midway through the set by legendary OC punks Middle Class. How had I never heard of this place again? The scene felt more like a party than a concert. The walls were covered in art; Ice Cold PRB’s were yours for a fair donation of $2 and holy crap check out the dining car in the corner. As Middle Class cranked out their set a large a friendly circle pit took up a good chunk of the main floor. To further prove the anything goes philosophy of the venue, the pit featured one crusty punk sipping from a flask while others skateboarded around him. That’s something you sure as hell won’t see at any of the venues on the Sunset Strip.

Want to know what else you don’t see on the Sunset Strip? The headliner taking the stage puffing upon a big fat joint. That’s exactly what Meat Puppets did on this Saturday night before kicking off their set with a smoking Lake of Fire. Despite a less than stellar PA, the band were just warming up as they rocked the room hard on classic Puppet songs such as Touchdown King and Walking Boss.

With pits filled with punkers swirling I was excited when the band launched into one of my favorite songs Up On The Sun. Clocking in at 9 minutes the band was more like Phish than punk as Curt Kirkwood led the band into a deep jam. Then again with large clouds of pot smoke rising from the sweat soaked crowd I would say it indeed was more a Phish show than a punk show by this point.

Speaking of pot smoking, the newest member of the Meat Puppets, Elmo Kirkwood found plenty of time to partake in California’s best medicine as joints and bowl were passed to him (as well as his uncle, bassist Cris Kirkwood) all night. Other highlights of the 90 minute set including sweet takes on Comin’ Down, Hey Baby Que Paso (Texas Torandos cover))and Sam.

After a rocking version of Plateau, the band closed their set with what I would describe as a 20 minute noise jam. I am sure there were some songs from the band’s early career in there that I don’t know the title of, but not even a broken high E string on Elmo’s pink Squire guitar could stop the band from heading deep into the wacky uncharted water.

At the end of the jam, the band left the tiny stage for just a moment. Where it looked as if an encore was coming, the Puppets ended up disappearing into back private room. As it turns out the venue that allows skate boarding and even pets had a hard curfew which the Puppets were apparently past. Despite a few fans up front chanting for the band (and one guy grabbing the mic letting the crowd know he band would return to perform Kiss Alive Volumes 2 & 4 in their entirety) the show was over. For as great as the subway to the sea will be, I walked out sad that I discovered a rad spot for music on the last night of its existence. So big thanks to the Meat Puppets for rocking Santa Monica on a Saturday night. Feel free to come back to Santa Monica when your untitled 14th album drops in 2013.

While the band spends these days in the studio working on their 14th studio album, here we are at another Jay Porks “From The Vault” piece that has everything to do with the Meat Puppets. Hey, if they’re gonna go with reruns most of this week on all the late night shows then we’re going to continue to search the web for cool stuff that has been seen on TV, whether it was this decade or not. Don’t worry though, this time we violate both Network and Cable television.

This past Friday, this Meat Puppets super-fan had found footage online of the band performing on The Late Late Show with Craig Kilborn back in October of 2000. To try and paint a picture, I’ve been to nine of this band’s live shows.. I’ve talked to management, band members, random audio tapers in the crowds, and even checked the never ending land of the torrents-this footage was NO where to be found. Then a few weeks ago, after we posted the video we found of the Pups on the Beverly Hills 90210 pilot , I happened to bump into somebody in the comment thread who had the video. After I cried tears of joy for about 20 minutes, I got a hold of the band doing “Hercules” on Kilborn. But they performed two songs that evening according to Shandon Sahm via email, he says they split it into two episodes. So below, I’m happier than a pig in shit (Porks, get it?) to share with you video of the band doing another jam off Golden Lies , this one being “Armed and Stupid”.

Meat Puppets-“Armed and Stupid”

In typical commercial cliche fashion: But wait, there’s more! Well there is. Along with this, I was pointed by yet another fan to a Vimeo account that had about 20 minutes of footage of an episode of 120 Minutes the Meat Puppets guest hosted on MTV in 1995. If you watch the video, I guess Thurston Moore was suppose to be there too-there’s some hilarious banter in there in better quality then anything that’s on YouTube at the moment. They play the videos for “Backwater”, “Get On Down”, and “Scum” towards the end with a live performance of “Lake of Fire” mixed in there. You know, that song everyone thinks is a Nirvana song.

Meat Puppets Guest Host 120 Minutes (1995)

Meat Puppets 2012 US Dates:

10/13 The Sco’ Oberlin, OH

10/19 Lola’s Forth Worth, TX

10/20 Fitzgerald’s Houston, TX

Follow the band on Twitter ‘@TheMeatPuppets‘ for updates and contests and stuff.

From The Vault: Meat Puppets Perform on The Late Late Show w/ Craig Kilborn (2000)

Who says the As Seen On TV section here at Concert Confessions must be relegated to stuff that aired this week.. or this decade for that matter.

A few weeks ago, we shared with you a ‘From The Vault’ piece that contained video of the Meat Puppetsperforming on the pilot episode of Beverly Hills 90210. We can all agree that it was an awesome nugget of history to find. In the same post, this writer and Meat Puppets super-fan asked if anyone out there happen to have somewhere on a hard drive in their ex-wives storage, the episode(s) of Craig Kilborn that the band appeared on in October of 2000. Welp, someone found it!

With a clever and factual YouTube user name of “PearlJamBlowGoats”, it seems we have at least one of the songs performed on the show up on the internet now. This is the “Golden Lies” era of the Meat Puppets, and it features Shandon Sahm on Drums, Kyle Ellison adding a 2nd guitar and I hope to be corrected if I’m wrong, but that looks like Andrew Duplantis on Bass, as this was a sans-Cris Kirkwood time of the band. The video of the band performing “Hercules” is below, and that says “Dork” on Shandon’s chest at the end of the song; let’s pray that CBS doesn’t take this down-but we will hint that in messages with the uploader of this video, there IS more to come.

As you know by now, the Meat Puppets have a book out, an oral history by Greg Prato titled “Too High To Die: Meet The Meat Puppets” . You can grab hold of a copy of that book at their official website TheMeatPuppets.Com . Their also playing three US dates (1 in Ohio this writer’s trying to get to), and you can find out all about that on the the tour page of their site. And follow the band on Twitter “@TheMeatPuppets”

The Meat Puppets have a book out, an oral history to be precise. Titled “Too High To Die: Meet The Meat Puppets” It features interviews with Flea, Peter Buck, Henry Rollins, Ian MacKaye, Kim Thayil, Dave Pirner and Scott Asheton, among the immensely long, epic guest list. Waiting for my copy in the mail, you can order yours by going to the bands official website. And there in lies the reason we’re here. Figured we’d add a little online chapter to this oral history, since we know for a fact video footage cannot be found in paperback (yet, anyway).

The year was 1990. Aaron Spelling was in the midst of building his latest empire, and the Meat Puppets where about to release their first album NOT on the infamous SST record label: Forbidden Places, which is now out of print. Somehow, somewhere in the magical land of California circa 1990, these forces crossed paths to fuse the greatest thing I’ve ever found on the Internet since Katy Perry rapping or That cat who can eat with chopsticks.

No secrets here, The Meat Puppets are a band this writer lives and dies for (Much like our Rev Justito with Phish). I will go see them every time they come to town, every time I can afford a plane ticket to where ever they play, etc. So years back when I stumbled upon that interview where bassist Cris Kirkwood said that they performed on the pilot episode of 90210, and it was called “Beverly Hills High” at the time, he didn’t realize that he sent me on a life long search for this footage. I’ve asked their tour manager, friends of the band- if anybody has this footage anywhere and it was not to be. Then, late last night I took a stab at YouTube again, and sure enough I found it. I can’t believe I found it. I want to write those words in all caps because I’m so excited, but that would be unprofessional. And I kinda blew my vocal chords last night screaming in my house, waking my mother from a drunken sleep. Did I mention this stuff excites me? So, before too many people see it and it’s taken off the internet, check out the videos below of The Meat Puppets performing at a HUGE High School party, they’re in the back yard by the pool. You have to fast forward to 8 Minutes into the first video where you’ll hear “Paradise” in the back round. Then, they get into “Attacked by Monsters” and you have to switch to the next video to continue on (where they play “Paradise” as oppose to just hearing it in the background earlier) . All I’m thinking during these songs is “Damn, I wish these rich preppy f#%ks would shut the hell up so I can hear this killer band!”

Fast Forward to about 20 Minutes into this vid for the first hearing of the Meat Puppets. The English version of the pilot has been edited to remove the Puppets, but this one still contains them. Attacked By Monsters and Paradise are the songs they play.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3tyzO_Cw8KI

Follow the band on Twitter @TheMeatPuppets , and the book is a Jay Porks Suggested Read for sure, so go buy it at their webstore : TheMeatPuppets.Com/Store

Now if anyone can find footage of the Meat Puppets of Craig Kilborn’s late night show back in 2001 Season 3, Episode 74 my life would be almost complete.

Last year, the Meat Puppets put out their 13th Studio Album ‘Lollipop’, made stops at SXSW, played the Minehead All Tomorrow’s Parties Festival in the United Kingdom curated by Animal Collective along with some other dates overseas, opened for Soundgarden on a few dates in the US and Canada-Including the Gorge Amphitheater, then finished up the year strong with over 25 shows running up and down the East Coast(which we also covered in NYC and NJ) and parts of the Mid West.

It’s still early, but 2012 is already shaping up to just as big of a year if not bigger. With a new record already at least in it’s preliminary stages, and a St. Patty’s Day show in Hood River, Oregon-a few more dates have been squeezed from the realms of the internet, three of them in Italy! That’s right, The Meat Puppets will be performing their classic record “Meat Puppets II” in it’s entirety at all three stops in the land of the pasta.

I would not count out the Meat Puppets showing up at the Austin Psych Fest-which is held April 27-29 in Austin, TX. Just based on the two dates in Texas during which the festival is being held, it makes sense.

In the meantime, the video below should hold over any Meat Puppets itch you have until they come to your town. The 2nd guitarist in the video is Elmo Kirkwood, son of Curt, who was touring with the band on the Fall 2011 leg of their tour.

As 2011 reaches a close, we take a look back at the year in concerts. In volume, I probably attend the least amount of total shows per year if you pool all of the contributors here at Concert Confessions. But never the less, by years end I will have reached 23 concerts, eclipsing last years total of 20. My only personal goal is to always get out to more shows then the year before. We did that in 2011, and here’s hoping we crack a bigger mark in 2012. Back to the reminiscing, here’s the Top Ten Jay Porks Exerperience’s of 2011

It was a cold night in February. I remember it like it was yesterday-it was the day before I was to get my Blackberry, and I remember the whole night being pissed about how if I would’ve gotten a new phone earlier that day I’d leave here tonight with better quality photos. Speaking of photos, the Reverend Justito was able to go through channels and gain me a photo pass for the first 3 songs of their set. It was at this time that I would stand about an arms distance from the late Cory Smoot/Flatimis Maximus while getting soaked in GWAR fluids, which would later add some difficulty to hailing a cab after the show-being that it looked like I was covered in blood. Awesome times [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXrJ0Kw6d_Y&w=480&h=360]

I know what your all thinking-How the hell does he throw Hip Hop into his Top Ten? Well, a week or so prior to Joe Budden replying to a Tweet of mine setting off a back and forth which gained me a collective middle finger from his fan base, he played with Slaughterhouse at SOB’s. This is the show that made me buy the tickets to see the man solo at Irving Plaza, and even though that was terrible, I can’t deny what Budden, Royce Da 5’9′, ‘Joell Ortiz’ and ‘Crooked I’ did to the stage at SOB’s that night. And that was setting it on fire. Also, one of the openers ‘Emilio Rojas’, I promise you will headline shows in 2012. He sounded like the future.

8)Chris Cornell @ Town Hall(4/13/11)
With a Soundgarden full on reunion tour not yet confirmed, I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to see Mr. Chris Cornell on his Solo Acoustic Songbook Tour. The hair is back, and in full Jesus mode Cornell blessed us with hits from Soundgarden, Audioslave, his own solo catalog and mixed in a Beatles cover along with a, brace yourselves, acoustic cover of Ghostland Observatory’s “Sad Sad City”.

Overlooking the balcony on the 3rd floor of Terminal 5 for an epic night of events. If it wasn’t enough that I was seeing Dinosaur Jr., we had Keith Morris in the building with his latest band. OFF!. In addition to that we had the critical acclaimed “Fucked Up”. And the frosting for the cake, Henry Freakin’ Rollins interviewed Dinosaur Jr on stage before their set, an interview I captured in it’s entirety and it up on YouTube. Also got most of their set, they had great lighting and my spot was of epic proportions. [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5n0mEa2r_hM&w=480&h=360]

6)Local H Mercury Lounge (4/21/11)
Local H is one of those bands that will probably always find there way on my year end best list if they come around to my neck of the woods, and that’s just what happened. Not only that, but they were booked for an “Early show” at the Mercury Lounge-which means doors at 7PM and show was to end promptly at 9:30. No problem for Scott Lucas and Brian St. Clair, who kicked out about 20 jams in the time they had on stage, including 2 songs from a forthcoming Local H record: “Cold Matter” and “Another February”(which I have video of below this paragraph). Covered ‘Joey’ by Concrete Blonde and “Wolf Like Me” courtesy of TV on the Radio. During Wolf Like Me, Scott came off stage with his guitar and played, like, into the camera was recording with and eventually was jamming out leaning against me as people snapped photos of him in the crowd. What Mercury Lounge is great for in not having security so I can tape, they suck at lights-and there is no conclusive proof of this on video. At least my buddy who I met into at the Lemonheads show says he remembers me from the crowd and remembers seeing that happen. Got an autograph from Mr. Lucas after the show and gave it to my friend Pam, who was defeated by New York City traffic trying to make it there. [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3sXiip0fN78&w=480&h=360]

5)Flaming Lips&Weezer Get Freaky On The Same Stage PNC (7/28/11)
So when I saw the show listed on Ticketmaster it was billed “Weezer/Flaming Lips” yet when my ticket arrived in the mail it said “Flaming Lips/Weezer”. I figured at the least I save myself time seeing some crap opener, as I like both these bands. As the show drew near, it was announced that the bands would both set their gear up on stage, and take turns playing songs back and forth. Now isn’t this interesting? And it turned out to be even way more fun then I imagined. With limited time, sort of, Weezer wasn’t able to squeeze into their set a bunch of songs I hate. Plus they kicked off the night both bands on stage playing Black Sabbath’s “Sweat Leaf” with Wayne Coyne and Rivers Cuomo floating the pit area in space bubbles. After 2 hours of back and forth hits from both bands, they shared the stage again to play “She Don’t Use Jelly” followed by “Undone(The Sweater Song)” before going off. Awesomeness. I was still giddy as I wrote the review on a plane flying off to Washington State-that’s a hint for things to come on this list. [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0d2iws3WKGc&w=480&h=360]

The Meat Puppets returned to New York City for the first time in 2 years to play Le Poisson Rouge. They would play 2 nights later in Teaneck, NJ at Mexicali Live with me in attendance as well. It’s a tie because on both nights they would equally scorch the stage they played frying hearts and minds-yet it was two totally different experiences for me despite the set list not varying much. Night one in NYC I got backstage, and was able to hang with the boys before the show and even got to meet Sean Yseult (bass player who started a little band called White Zombie with dude named Rob), who was nothing less then a bad ass chick-I mean that in the awesome sense. But after all that it ended up I couldn’t get a good spot up front and had to extend my arm up full length when recording songs(the good news being I don’t have to hide my camera from anyone, being the Social Media Assistant for the band I am actually permitted and encouraged to do so).

Two nights later I meet up with Pam in Teaneck, NJ-a little hidden spot of Northern New Jersey I never even knew existed. My intentions on this night are to finally show off my favorite band still touring to one of my good friends- [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4yeJftK_l5Q&w=480&h=360]
one of the few friends I have in real life who’s musical taste I respect. She’s never seen them, and this was to be my 9th time. Check this out, you know that band Black Box Revelation that’s been blowing up by the show? Yea, they opened up this one before they set off w/ Beady Eye on tour a week or so later. They were awesome. And my great spot for video during this Meat Puppets set as oppose to they Friday night set is not even comparable. I got everything I needed to get and more. About halfway during set Pam says to me “This drummer is amazing”. That drummer is Shandon Sahm (son of Doug Sahm, I’m gonna let you use Wikipedia for this one), and for the nights encore as it would have been Doug Sahm’s 70th Birthday day, we saw Curt Kirkwood relinquish his guitar to Shandon and took a seat at the drum kit. They then played “She’s About A Mover”, a Sir Douglas Quintet cover with Curt on drums and Shandon Sahm singing and playing guitar. Got Curt to autograph Pam’s ticket after the show. Freaking amazing weekend of the Meat Puppets, hence my tie for 3rd/4th place. [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTZw1SJbg4g&w=480&h=360]

2)Ween Hammerstein Ballroom: Halloween 2011
For a second year in a row through circumstances beyond their control, Ween fall one spot short of the top spot on my best shows of 2011 list. It was Halloween, it was WEEN at Hammerstein Ballroom in the city. We tore the seated section 103 apart, stacking chairs creating a standing room frenzy. They did another “Evening w/ Ween” which includes no opening acts-and played for the better part of three hours dressed up for Halloween in skimpy sailor outfits. It was amazing, and even through picking up the pieces of my face on the way out the door-the number one spot had already been locked in. [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fn820V9WMhw&w=480&h=360]

Remember when I said I was writing the Flaming Lips/Weezer review on a plane heading to Washington State? Yea well, that was one insane weekend. With tour guides TheNaturalStoner and Mr. Sparkly taking care of me, we were off on Saturday July 30th of 2011 to the Gorge Amphitheater to see Soundgarden, Queens of the Stone Age, Mastodon, and THE MEAT PUPPETS. This was before any Meat Puppets dates were locked for NYC so I had to make sure I caught them right? Plus opening for Soundgarden?!? A band I’ve been waiting to see for years and years. And sandwich in Queens of the Stone Age, which I missed out on a presale from their NYC show in March and how can we think this could get any better? Well, it got better as soon as we were at the top of the grassy hill looking down at the stage camped so behind it is the beautiful Columbia River and mountainside. 18,000 people get in this place, standing room exclusive. If it wasn’t enough that I got to see the Meat Puppets for the 7th time that night, I also got to see Soundgarden close out strong. And while Queens of the Stone Age kicked out songs I love, like “Go With The Flow” & “No One Knows” ,with the sun setting and beams of light bouncing off the river and silhouetting the people on the lawn.. man that 8-10 minutes right there may have been the greatest moment of my life(well, besides Jen Cartiglia). We had from what I counted 5 of us Concert Confessioners in attendance- Myself, TheNaturalStoner & Mr. Sparkly in one tent trying to get texts through to Phishbeard to meet up with us, while at the same time we tried to gain WiFi to find Jakob. The whole Washington experience blew me away, and the show being that epic wasn’t hurting matters either. Camped out afterward sleeping on a folding chair using a sleeping bag as a blanket starring up at the stars, which I can actually see in a state without the air pollution that New York City contains. Woke everyone around us camping up early due to my phone’s alarm clock still being on east coast time. The video I share below is not one that I shot, but shot by TheNaturalStoner. Since I was standing right next to him anyway, and his camera is way better then mine, here you go: [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iou9tnsHt6w&w=640&h=360]

Honorable Mentions!!

I seriously wanted to put Charlie Sheen’s Violent Torpedo of Truth tour in here, but I didn’t want to take the crap from all the trolls out there who DIDN’T attend…But damn that was a pretty freaking epic night, awesome times with friends.. hence it’s honorable mention.

-Phish, Night 1 of their MSG New Years Eve run was pretty funky as well, had this list not been done before I attended the show on 12/28/11, it would have been up for nomination

I’ve been to a ton of concerts this year, thanks in part to my awesome Dad for putting up with my concert-going needs. Well out of the many I’ve been to this year, here are my top 10. I am not doing top 10 live bands, but the top 10 shows. So here we go.

10. Social Distortion 02/12/11 – Showbox SoDo – Seattle, WA

Although I didn’t write a review of this show (I hadn’t discovered CC yet), this is the show that kicked off my 2011 concert season. Punk legends Social Distortion playing three sold out nights in a row in Seattle is just an outstanding feat. They played a great setlist and they were loud and crazy. Mike Ness and the boys may be kinda old, but they still put out great music and put on great shows (Photo from 10/29/11).

Two days before seeing Soundgarden at the Gorge, I was seeing Hassidic reggae/rapper Matisyahu at the Portland Zoo. Matisyahu put on an energetic, albeit short, concert to a mostly Jewish crowd (I think there was a Hebrew school field trip there). There was certainly more weed than I expected, but it was a cool show with great vibes. Oh and being Jewish makes it more of a rite of passage than a concert.

I also had the pleasure of not only seeing but also being the youngest person seeing 90s post-grunge superstars Bush. After a decade-long breakup, the British band got back together for a tour that hit theaters and small clubs. Seeing them at the brand new venue The Neptune Theater just made it that much cooler, and Bush put on a brilliant show that rocked very hard. Gavin Rossdale sings better than I’ve ever heard him before.

Bumbershoot is an annual music/arts festival that takes place at the Seattle Center. While 2010’s festival sported big name acts like Weezer, Bob Dylan, Mary J. Blige, Meat Puppets, Hole, and Rise Against, this year’s festival was headlined by Wiz Khalifa, Presidents of the United States of America, Ray LaMontagne, and Hall and Oates. I was almost not gonna go until I won tickets for day 2 of the festival. I was able to see bands like The Kills (kind of), Butthole Surfers, Atari Teenage Riot, NoMeansNo, and internet comedy act The Gregory Brothers.

The recently reunited alternative metal band System of a Down did a short west coast tour earlier this year, including Seattle’s own Key Arena. Not only that, but they chose gypsy punk collective Gogol Bordello to open for them, a band I happen to love. Both bands put on amazing shows, with SOAD playing a 29-song set. It was also my very first review. (Read with caution).

Unfortunately, there are people out there unaware of Echo Movement’s mind-warpingly fantastic music. Lead singer Stephen Fowler and his brother, keyboardist, Dave, are the greatest songwriting duo since Lennon-McCartney. They inspire nothing but good vibes, and they are some of the nicest dudes ever. So take their motto to heart, and “listen to Echo Movement.”

4. Zeds Dead (12/9):

Say what you will about dubstep, I love it. The overall energy and feel of it just makes me want to get up and dance way more than Ke$ha ever will. Skrillex has more talent in his ridiculous glasses than Ke$ha does in her whole body. Well anyway, Toronto-based dubstep duo Zeds Dead (named after the famous Pulp Fiction quote) rocked the house with their rockin’ house music (see what I did there?). After numerous songs mashed into one (nonstop!), they encored with The Pixies‘ Where is My Mind?, and Weezer’s Say It Ain’t So. Long story short, see a dubstep show.

After days of bugging my dad to get me tickets to this show, I had to settle with the upper seating area of Key Arena. It was ok, though. I had a great view of great bands such as Mumford and Sons, Death Cab for Cutie (blech), Cage the Elephant, Foster the People, Young the Giant, Two Door Cinema Club, and Grouplove. The show was almost overwhelming with its sheer beauty, and it may have been more of a Christmas show (I am Jewish), but it was still wonderful.

2. Sasquatch 2011 Day 1 05/27/11 – Gorge Amphitheater – George, WA

Unfortunately, I only had the opportunity to see one night of the world-famous Sasquatch Festival. Fortunately, though, I was able to see Foo Fighters, one of the biggest bands in the galaxy. I also got the chance to see newly reunited garage rock duo Death From Above 1979, and new punk lords Against Me! The drive to the Gorge that day may have been difficult, but dancing to “Everlong” with strangers totally made up for it (Click here to read our review of Sasquatch Day 1 from our pals thenaturalstoner and Phishbeard.

No doubt, this is the best show I’ve been to. Not only did I have the opportunity to see the newly reunited Gods of grunge metal, but I got to see them with alt-rock stoners Queens of the Stone Age, muscular man metal band Mastodon, and classic indie rockers Meat Puppets. PLUS: I got to see them at the beautiful and fantastic Gorge Amphitheater. Soundgarden played through their classics, and I left the Gorge feeling tired and sore. Twas an awesome show.

I hope you enjoyed my Top 10!

Here’s to another great year of concerts. *coughREDHOTCHILIPEPPERS*cough*TOOL*cough*NOELGALLAGHER*cough*BONNAROO*

It would’ve been Doug Sahm’s 70th Birthday today, and what better place to start the 60th edition of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series the trekking out Teaneck, NJ and Mexicali Live for another shot of the Meat Puppets! They fried hearts and minds this past Friday at Le Poisson Rouge in the city, and upon purchasing the tickets I figured this venue was a lot closer than it was-so how can I turn up this up? 15 bucks? Then to sweeten the deal, my father (Call him anything besides Sr. Porks-he’ll kill you) offers to drive me up to the place, bout an hour from my house. PLUS with have Pam(sans van) meeting me here to take in the epic madness that is this band, and she offered to drive me home afterward. Although I’ve yet to find a cool name (like Pam-Van) for the new Volkswagen Jetta, but I’m sure one will come to me. Anyway, doors are at 6PM, show’s at 8, I roll up front around 7-it is party time my friends.

I don’t know where they found this place, hidden in the depths of northern New Jersey lays this really cozy, cool music venue/bar/restaurant. I mean, even though I don’t plan on eating, as a fat guy it’s good to know food is at least available. The have tables set up where you can order dinner and watch from there, but the standing room in front of it would kill your view. Upstairs had a few tables and looked like it could’ve been a sweet spot to film from, but again you need to order stuff to sit at a table-pshht, please. Saw Elmo Kirkwood at the merch table, had to go over and compliment him on the fine performance I got to witness on Friday.. Shandon passed by, I patted him on the back as I ran out to meet Pam-Curt and Cris where down the block by the van.. In time I’ll make it there, in time.

We settled in and actually decided to see what this first band ‘Jounce’ was all about. Their twitter page describes them as “Not unlike Kings Of Leon”.. Well, that would explain me not exactly being blown away, I mean they were tight and all-lead singer was playing bass.. They played from like 8:03 to 8:49.. but the more interesting part came outside afterward while I was smoking a cig talking Puppets with fellow fans, this dude in the group upon google search says “Hey man you know who the lead singer of Jounce is? It’s that kid from the show ‘The Adventures of Pete and Pete’ that used to be on Nickelodeon in the 90s”.. Now that’s hilarious-I mean in good way. I liked that show, and maybe had I known this previously I would’ve cared a little more about their set! Danny Tamberelli. Wasn’t he in those Mighty Ducks movies too? Now he’s opening for the Meat Puppets-not a bad deal at all.

Next up was Black Box Revolution, going with the 2 man line-up just drums and guitar. The lead singer had this voice that sounded exactly like Iggy Pop to me-maybe I’m crazy. And during their set I saw someone who was in the posse of laughter outside that was the Pete and Pete discovery standing near by-I leaning in and said “So what-is the dude in this band from the show ‘Are You Afraid of The Dark’ or something?”. ZING. A timely punchline is one of my strong points. Anyway, these guys played from like 9:09 to 9:50ish..

Main event time: At 10:04 out stroll the legends themselves, THE MEAT PUPPETS!

This whole set had a different feel, even with a lot of the same songs from the other night. I mean, maybe it’s Mexicali Live in the air-because after “I’m a Mindless Idiot” and “Coming Down”-we had ourselves a good old fashioned ho-down going to the right of me and Pam. We had a nice spot along the wall so I could take video from way closer than the other night-maybe a bit too close but at least tall people didn’t dominate the front row. And I’m right in front of Elmo, who jams out with Cris on this side of the stage. Every time I’m in front of Curt I leave not being able to hear for days, figured a new method should be employed here.

I’m pissed I didn’t get it on film, but that had to be a plus 10 minute version of “Up On the Sun”.. it was crazy, it just kept blasting off into space. See that’s the thing about this band-every show, every song, every time Curt backs away from the mic and lets loose it’s like we blast off into space.. I’ve never taken LSD, but I’m pretty sure the psychedelic euphoria I experienced tonight is up to par as far as intensity. With no ceiling tonight, they can really get jam out for extended periods on songs. Clocked an 8 minute version of “Backwater” later on in the set.

Even with the same group of songs all of this is new to me, and this is my 9th Meat Puppets show.. Guessed I’m hooked on that drug called good music.

Pam was amazed at my ability to hold a camera and type songs down on my iPod trying to get the whole set list. “Sam” got hectic-this dude was really getting down with his bad self over there, and after the song he looked at me and recited the lyric “That’s the way Sam plays around”. Rock on brother-it’s all good times. “Where Does a Little Tear Come From”, (which people are crediting to George Jones, but he had just as much input writing the song as did Perry Como-so it’s your decision on that one. Great song either way went into, again, on of my favorites they’ve been playing on this tour- “Open Wide”. When “Sloop John B” started, I turned to Pam and said “it’s this right into Lake of Fire”-which is exactly what it was. Lake of Fire had this siren-like guitar effect going at the beginning,

which I screaming ‘Mind Boggling!’ to. Clocked it at 10 minutes and 10 seconds-they rock that bitch out. And here’s one thing I find amazing, Curt throughout the show was walking over to Cris and Elmo, while playing and having like, conversations with them. I can’t hear myself think, these guys are flying us full speed into outer space while discussing things. I could barely talk and walk at the same time! Genius’s. They ducked off at 11:45.

Came back out a few minutes later, and Curt announced that it was(would have been) Doug Sahm’s 70th Birthday today to a load roar of the crowd, as anyone with Wikipedia knows that the drummer of the Meat Puppets, Shandon Sahm is the son of Doug. So they played another fav of mine-”Hey Baby Que Paso” before Curt went over to the drums and was talking to Shandon before giving him a hand wave and walking away to the mic saying “Let’s get Shandon to sing one!” and everyone in the building was on board. So out comes Shandon from behind the drums where Curt takes over after handing his guitar off to him. Awesome, this should be fun. Never seen Shandon sing before-if anything this could be kinda goofy. Goofy it was NOT. Wow! Shandon went totally IN on “She’s About a Mover”,

a Sir Douglas Quintet song, one of the many Doug Sahm projects. And Curt held his own behind the drums as Shandon destroys it over there in Curts spot. When it’s solo time he screams “Play some solo Elmo!” to which Elmo shreds for a few. Listen to that video I posted one time and tell me that’s not in your head all day. Shandon says “That was for Pop!” and Curt comes out and says goodnight to us.. Great song, great end to an amazing night.. it was about Midnight.

I got what I’m calling a partial set list because I think I’m missing one or two here that I didn’t write down… And I have video of what I think was “Going to Graceland” that I kept rolling into “Wasted Days and Wasted Nights”, but I’ll need to upload it and have some troll correct me just to be sure. What a two show stretch.. Wish there was another show in town I could catch-I could do this every night of my life!

Partial Set List missing a song or two probably

I’m a mindless idiot
Coming down
The monkey and the snake
Up on the sun
Touchdown king
Plateau
Lantern
Sam
Lost
Where does a little Tear Come From
Open wide
Oh me
Backwater
Seal Whales> Maiden’s Milk
Orange
-Going to Graceland
Wasted days and Wasted nights
Sloop John b
Lake of fire

Encore:
Hey Baby Que Paso

She’s About A Mover (Shandon sings/guitar, Curt on drums)

Want to download the audio from this show? Well you can, and it’s not illegal or anything! Archive.Org and the Meat Puppets have been working together for a while now bringing together the matrix’s of shows old and new. So if you know torrents and all that, click here to download!

The Meat Puppets return to NYC in this edition( the 59th) of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series which takes us to “Le Poisson Rouge” at 158 Bleecker St. Doors are at 6:30- show’s suppose to start at 7. The deal is, there is a “dance party” scheduled at this same venue at 11PM. Lets see how this plays out.

Never been to this venue before. Found the place at almost 7 and headed in to check the room out. You walk in and the stage is immediately at the door to your left. Bar along the back, nice cozy room here. There are tables, but those are at a 2 drink minimum-and at this place that means $24. Seats not worth that much- especially with the 11pm party-it’s already 730. I’ve stood for way longer than this before-this day in history-fat guy passed on seat.

Chatted with Elmo Kirkwood, Curt’s son, outside the place before his friends showed up. Elmo used to have a band called Kirkwood-Dellinger that broke up and for this leg of the tour, he’s with the Meat Puppets as a 2nd guitarist…as I told him- ” to add a little extra oomph to this party”.. I went to hang by the merch table after that, chat with some fans and hopefully run into some of the 100000 people I’ve been telling about this show for weeks. Noticed Curt walking around outside having a conversation with someone, and Cris also walked by me outside.

Found drummer Shandon Sahm inside. We got to talking a bit before he went backstage. Then Cris came out and was taking pictures with a few folks. I didn’t wanna go over there at first because I remember the first time I met him-and I woulda been pissed if someone who’s already met him several times came over and ruined my glory. So when the smoke cleared I walked over, we got to talking. The show at the Gorge was brought up, and Cris says to me “You know what band I was really diggin? Mastodon!”. Where ever I go, Mastodon will follow me. So he heads backstage, and is holding the door open for me, like to come in. REALLY?!?! Is this real life right now? So I head back there to see a relaxed Curt smoking a cig, Cris goes to pluck his bass around and Curt was saying how they had to go on asap after Dex Romweber Duo(the opening act I missed, but had SEVERAL people on the line tell me that Dex was the greatest thing since sliced bread, so Sunday I’ll pay attention) because they had to be off by 10. Noticed Curt’s Les Paul behind me-this will be the first time I’ve seen them live on the east coast where he isn’t using the teal Strat. Interesting. Dex came backstage as he was finished, it was a little past 8 and I told the boys to have a good set as I was to run out for a smoke before they kicked things off. Before I left, I ran into Sean Yseult, The original Bass player from White Zombie. Cool chick too.

Anyway time for the main event as around 8:30 out come the legendary Meat Puppets! Led off with “I’m a Mindless Idiot”, “Touchdown King”, “Plateau”, “The Monkey and the Snake”.. This place is rocking-the sound in here is amazing, I’m all the way in the back(of this tiny room) taping with the coat check guy behind me, who has already stated he doesn’t care what the hell I film. Great. I didn’t catch “Coming Down” in time to get but after that they kicked into a triple shot of “Sam”, “Lantern”(from the new record Lollipop) and a cover of “Wasted Days Wasted Nights”(Freddy Fender) -all of which are uploading to YouTube as I type these word. Lantern is a great track-glad they’re playing it on this tour. And I’m so pumped about hearing Wasted Days Wasted Nights live. That was freaking amazing.

“Oh, Me” was even extra powerful with the filthy licks of Elmo Kirkwood filling out guitar parts to just let his father shred. I present example A as the 8 minute version of “Up On The Sun”, which towards the middle always gets crazy regardless, now has an added twang to it. This is my 8th time seeing the band and they get more intense every time. Lyrics get screamed louder, guitars get louder, songs get heavier-and every single second of it is magic. To go from “Up On The Sun” to “Seal Whales” seamlessly may seem somewhat challenging to the laymen yet the legends Kirkwood(and Sahm) make it look easy.

Here comes my favorite moment of the night: “Hey Baby Que Paso”…another Freddy Fender classic, and a song I’ve been singing to the kitchen staff a work since I saw video of them doing it at SXSW. Love that damn song. Taped it, followed by “Light” and “Open Wide”. Open Wide was insanity. Then, I was able to be the first to have a ‘Live’ version of the song “Orange”(off of Lollipop) on to YouTube.

Closing in on 10PM now, and what else to do now but bust out the Perry Como? Yea that’s right, my grandmother would be proud she loved Perry Como. Anyway, the song is “Where Does a Little Tear Come From?” and it’s awesome. And afterward they had a little blues jam going for like a minute, and recognizing the time, and the chords sort of, I knew it was ‘Backwater’- a face stomping version of Backwater finishing off at precisely 10PM. But wait, Curt puts his glasses on at this point, and we’re jumping into another tune past curfew. Not one, but TWO no less. It was the Beach Boys “Sloop John B” which lead right into a blow your mind version of “Lake of Fire”, to end the night at roughly 10:10.

The mother fudging Meat Puppets-changing my life every time I see them. I don’t even know how I can improve my state of mind any more than I did tonight by seeing the boys tear down NYC yet again. Wait, I know the perfect thing to top this off-How bout I see them again Sunday in Teaneck,NJ at Mexicali Live?? Two words: Hell yes.Catch you early Monday morning-LATE!

For all Meat Puppets related information, head over to TheMeatPuppets.Com , Follow them on Twitter @TheMeatPuppets .

This past Friday night in Fayetteville, Arkansas The Meat Puppets kicked off the second leg of their 2011 U.S. tour at George’s Majestic Lounge.

What you may not know is that the Pups are holding contests for ticket holders in 6 of the 15 different cities (St.Louis, NYC, Teaneck(NJ), Boston, Chicago And Des Moines) they hit before year’s end, with giveaways of all sorts of cool stuff like:

Color vinyl LP’s of the new album ‘Lollipop’, exclusive tee shirts, and limited addition posters. The winners will be announced the night of the show, with prizes available at the Merchandise table, where if you so choose, can have your prizes signed by the band.

Entering the contest is simple as pie; Well, depending on what kind of pie you’re thinking about baking. Sometimes you can use the wrong pan or something , maybe not enough of that non-stick spray on stuff-it could really be a hassle. But this contest is FAR from a hassle.

All you have to do, is send an email over to MeatPuppets007@gmail.com .. that’s MeatPuppets007@gmail.com, with the city you’ll be seeing the band in the subject of the email. That is all you have to do, and expect a reply acknowledging your entry.

“After this year brought the release of “Lollipop”; The Meat Puppets 13th studio album, the boys are still in the swing of releasing things, and are set to reissue of their classic 1985 album “Up on the Sun” Today (September 13th). And no need to start calling up your local record stores to see if they have it, The Meat PuppetsOFFICIAL WEBSITE has a whole web store set up where you can pre-order and purchase all of your ‘Up on the Sun’ related gear. Whether you dig the grooves on your vinyl, compactness of your discs, or the speed of your digital downloads-TheMeatPuppets.Com has all of those goodies for you ready to ship out. All sorts of packages including ‘Up on the Sun’ themed posters and tee shirts(Even I don’t have THAT shirt!) are available there for you.. Great gifts for all occasions, send your child back to school wearing a band tee that shows he or she has some taste! And for readers on the east coast who have patient waited reading concert reviews in anticipation: The next leg of the Meat Puppets US touring kicks off this Wednesday September 14th in Louisiana at Chelsea’s. All confirmed Meat Puppets tour dates are listed below highlighted with links where you can find yourself some tickets, most shows are ranging in price from $12-$15/ticket. I’m already confirmed for two of these dates, as I’ll be at the NYC show 11/4 and Teaneck, NJ on 11/6.. There’s a show in Philly I’m trying to swing as well, but not sure if thats doable via public transportation in 24 hours. Either way, get your face melted this Fall with the brothers Meat.

Follow the Meat Puppets on twitter ‘@TheMeatPuppets’ and check out their official website TheMeatPuppets.Com, and ‘Like’ the Meat Puppets on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/meatpuppets And tell the boys Jay Porks sent ya!

Spent much of this weekend just staring around in amazement, repeating the phrase “Holy freaking God” over and over again. This is a special 53rd installment of the Jay Porks Never Ending Concert Series as it took us to Newark Airport, where I hopped on a plane and came out to Washington State(Home of the Cougs) to meet up with some of the Northwest chapter of Concert Confessions: thenaturalstoner ,Mr Sparkly (Who Are Hosting Me) and possibly another 3 as at last check we were to have five Concert Confessioners who will be in attendance at the Gorge Amphitheater in George, WA for the epic bill of Soundgarden, Queens of the Stone Age, Mastodon, and The Meat Puppets on an awesome summer Saturday … Had NOOOO idea what I was getting myself into..

‘We’re not at PNC Bank Arts Center anymore’ is the thought in my head as we start to drive into the campground.. yea that’s right I said it, campground. A sea of tents pitched everywhere, people getting wasted everywhere; and this place was about 1000 times the size of ANY venue I’ve ever been to in my homeland on the Least coast. If I was at this show by myself, there’s no way camping out all night would’ve even been a thought in my head. We don’t camp in NYC, we take sweaty train rides after shows and get home at 2AM… but there I was after the show sleeping on a folding chair outside the tent using a sleeping bag as a blanket , but trust me we will get to all that later.

So we pitch a tent, camp out and pre-funk for a little while.. we decide to head down to the box office and claim the photo passes that were left for us through me via Meat Puppets personnel.. To not run off on a tangent here, lets just send out thanks over to those imbeciles (Livenation) that run the box office at this place for fucking that photo pass experience up for me. If I wasn’t walking over this hill and seeing heaven on the other side, I’d be super pissed-as opposed to just really pissed.

So after several up hill climbs through the scorching hot sun (Yea, I came to Washington State and didn’t see one drop of rain, not one CLOUD my entire time here! False advertisement right there-I thought I was escaping the heat), we finally make it to the the gigantic mountainside that is The Gorge Amphitheater.. I’ve been to venues with lawn based seating, but this is ONLY lawn seating and the hill is a hell of a lot of steeper then the one at PNC in Homdel or that similar, bigger venue in Camden, NJ.. and it’s not a polluted highway behind the stage, it’s a freaking river. It’s like this piece of land split in half causing a canyon to open-and they placed a stage in the middle. I know I sound a little too blown away by seeing the Northwest -but I’m from the city, this is all new to me. A one mile stretch without a cement building is something I’ve never seen before-let alone a valley(or a “Gorge” they might say).

Meat Puppets come out at 6PM with the guns blazing, they were heavy from the start..I knew it was gonna be “Oh, Me” to kick it off by the sound of the guitar jingles.. but I didn’t know they were going to come out that intense with it. I was thrilled to see as many people down on the cement area in front of the stage(every part of this place is general admission-lawn tickets get you everywhere here) can walk down to the front and get rocking out.. Because I know a lot of people are missing them right now, and that sucks. Jumped into “Sam”, the lyrical demonstration that it is..moving faster than R.E.M.’s “It’s the end of the world as we know it”.. Then “Plateau”, which was fitting considering we hiked many hills and plateau’s to arrive where we are. Except there was way more “nothing at the top” at this Plateau, there was the freaking Meat Puppets right in front of me for the seventh time. It was the first time I’ve ever seen Curt Kirkwood use his Les Paul live with my own eyes before, the six times on the east coast I’ve seen them he played his teal Fender Strat.. That’s a query I need answered: Is it a coastal thing? Not like they sound any different, it’s just something that’s been in the back of my mind for a while. “Backwater” followed, the one Meat Puppets song I was able to get played on the radio when I was the in-studio guest at my local college radio station a week ago(88.9FM WSIA or www.WSIA.fm), so we were diggin our heels in, and again I loved the people up front so into it. That one time I caught the Pups as a first opener there was like 30 of us there at a 3500+ capacity venue it saddened me.. so glad I’m in WA. When they followed Backwater with “Sloop John B” (Beach Boys cover) I started getting really excited. Not for Sloop John B so much as for the fact that I was completely sold on the fact they would play “Hey Baby Que Paso”, I’ve been going over the lyrics to the song with the kitchen staff at my day job for months. Then I recognize the little lead in that’s about to be “Lake of Fire”.. as much as I love that freakin’ song, it hurt like a stab in the chest because I knew the set was ending in a little over 7 minutes when the end this song.. Damn, I figured this venue would give them at least 40 mins, they got a half hour, if not less. Again I’m not exactly from around these parts, but I know for a fact that the Meat Puppets didn’t request to only play six songs. I think doors should’ve opened earlier and had longer sets for the bands. It’s not like we’re in a residential area here-we’re all camping here all night.. I just don’t get it. The boys were done at 6:30

Which brings me to my next point: If there’s one band to remove from this bill to make this a full out amazing Ménage à trois of great bands playing long sets, which one would it be? Who’s the odd man out here? Then at 6:48 when Mastodon came out and we started to make our way back up the lawn, that was the question wondered aloud. And lets not take this as a shot at Mastodon, they do what they do and judging by the herds of people heading down for their set-they do it well. Caught them on the BlackDiamondSkye tour at it’s Madison Square Garden stop …so as they plowed through their 40 minutes set while we were walking up the mammoth lawn, they were plenty loud enough where we heard the entire set no matter how far away from the stage we went.

Another wild card to the evening, what is Queens of the Stone Age going to play? They’ve been on a album-themed tour, playing their first record in it’s entirety.. and we just had a 30 minute set followed by a 40 minute set. It’s 7:53 when they came out, there is a lot of show left tonight.

Not recognizing the first four songs was the indicator that this first album thing was going down. First song I recognized was “Giveth Then Take It Away”.. a little while later we had Josh Homme, who is the man by the way, saying “everyone’s waiting for it to get dark so they could do all those things they can’t do in the light” … introduced a song called “Make It Wit-Chu”, saying it was a song for the ladies. Then suddenly out of no where we turn and two people just got engaged during the song-now obviously that guy was aware of what the set list was going to be, we should’ve found him… from that guy popping the question and onward was magic.. my eyes are drawn to the left, as I notice the sun is beginning to set. I know it’s happens everyday, but man during those last three songs “Little Sister”, “Go with the Flow” and “No One Knows” with the sun setting and beams of light bouncing off the river, silhouetting the people on the lawn.. man that 8 minutes or so right there may have been the greatest moment of my life (well, besides Jen Cartiglia of course). They went off at 8:43.. epicness

So it’s coming up on 9 and Soundgarden is on deck.. Little note to keep in mind for the duration of Soundgarden’s set-I hate Eddie Vedder, and I hate Pearl Jam-personal preference, lets not muddy this up. Anyway, being the last show on Soundgarden’s tour and being in their backyard(even though Eddie Vedder is from California,he wears flannel so he can say he’s from there) combined with my luck I had a bad feeling we’d be having a Temple of the Dog section of the set and me in tears during everyone’s glee. All the awesome stuff I’ve seen over here in Washington, this gorgeous venue, this epic adventure can easily be turned into another Jay Porks Bogus Journey. I hate to be the one guy in the building praying for it not to happen(no I don’t), but I think I’m the only one in the building who traveled 3000+ miles for this. If would be the equivalent to finding out the hottest girl you know has a penis.

Save the suspense, as we can read in Jakob’s review, there was no PJ sighting, no Vedder appearances, no Hunger Strike or whatever non sense it is that they do…Also in Jakob’s review he mentions the bootleg tee shirts they were selling outside the venue.. it had all four bands listed on it. Not only did it have the wrong Meat Puppets drummer on it in the picture, but above the words Queens of the Stone Age was a picture of Pearl Jam. I, of course, bought this shirt. With Vedder staring right at me, didn’t notice it til the next day.. (I can’t get away from this guy). So besides that, I’m also thinking “How is Soundgarden going to top this? Seriously, what are they going to do, play a 2 hour set of nothing but their best?”

To answer the question in my last paragraph-Hell yes. It’s exactly what Soundgarden did. The sky was still a bit pink as the sun was behind the mountains. I don’t care how far away I was the sound if freaking golden on some of these videos I got.. 9:10 was the official first riff. And speaking of video, “Spoonman” was the 2nd song in.. “Gun” followed. This place is rocking like I’ve never seen a place rock before. And I got to see “Jesus Christ Pose”! For that girl screaming it in the row in front of me at Town Hall a few weeks back for Cornell’s Acoustic Songbook tour. See, 2 years ago when Soundgarden said they were getting back together, I didn’t think I’d have to wait this long to see them-I thought they’d do some heavy touring-they never did. So these guys were going to have to earn it blowing me away tonight.. and when “Blow up the Outside” smacked me in the face, I knew they were doing just that. Seeing Cornell acoustic songbook tour gave me a reminder that I needed to see this band live, one day, some how. Blow up the Outside at Town Hall just didn’t pack the punch that I needed it too-now here, it’s laying heavy fists to my face repeatedly..

Just an observation here, what’s up with the little slowed down version of “Black Hole Sun”? That’s the song I need to blow up in my face, not the song I can’t wait to hear toned down a bit-but that’s my only critique here about this set, and its minor. I’m just sayin’.. he’s screaming like hell on every other song so it’s not like he’s voice is out.. And then it was only 10:18 when the song ended, which begs the question: So when do they start packing up here? I’m not used to seeing bands just keep playing awesome songs for hours .. everyone else had short sets, who knows.. And keep in mind Vedder walking around the back of my head, me thinking I was going to have to walk out and meet the group at the campground.. Out of no where, Chris Cornell, in one of the more humorous displays I’ve seen, got pissed off that the NBA took Seattle’s basketball team. I don’t know what got him, maybe he spotted a Sean Kemp jersey in the crowd- but he starts saying “Man, they fucking took away our team-It’s fucking bullshit to take away a basketball team!”

Fell on Black Days, My Wave..-they’re still kicking out the fucking jams. During “Burden in my Hand” I asked thenaturalstoner if the lyrics were actually “I shot my load today”.. then around 10:40 he turns and is like “Pretty Noose and I’m good”.. Freaking psychic is what he is, and I forgot how much I love that song. Played “Rusty Cage” and “Head Down” right before it….By now I’m playing with house money, I had stopped taking pictures(or little video snippets) for a while to just sit back and enjoy this.. I’m in the Pacific Northwest watching Soundgarden tear the place apart. We kept saying to each other (Mr Sparkly by now is down front and apparently found Phish Beard) “So what else you think they got?, what else can they play?”

Well they could play , “Head Down” and“Outshined”before topping us off with “Superunknown” before ducking off at 10:52, only to come back out at 10:56 and rock three more songs. On the last song they rocked out and eventually drifted into a pure feedback orgy.. it made me want to cream my pants. They distorted sounds from 11:13 to 11:20, and that’s when the sound was turned down.. it was over.

This is usually the time where I gloat about catching whatever scheduled train I need.. but not the case tonight.. we’re climbing back up the hill and all the way down back to the campsite, where we will spend the night in the tent.. not for nothing, NYC’s been sweltering the last few weeks.. and here, unlike home, when the sun goes down it actually cools off significantly.. I had an extremely comfortable folding chair, plenty of bud and brews- I said “fuck it , pass my sleeping bag over, now it’s a blanket”. After the show while we’re (Me and thenaturalstoner until Mr Sparkly eventually showed up, minus Phishbeard) discussing the night’s proceedings (so glad to be at a show with these dudes, usually when I’m telling a random cab driver or some stranger about an epic night, I spend most of the discussion explaining to them who the bands are. NY is so lame).. main topic is Sparkly being quoted to saying he was “Underwhelmed”. And we’re just about to delve into this deep convo about what show he was watching, those dickheads camped out next to us who where annoying as hell before the show ended up showing up and annoyed the crap out of us all over again. All of a sudden the drummer has a mouth. These dudes say they’re in a band that “sounds like NOFX and Blink 182” named after some actor I can’t remember the name of now. Anyway, your band sounds like NOFX/Blink 182? Yea, that’s just about the time we called it a night.

A side note, my alarm on my phone set to 930 eastern time woke us, and the rest of the surrounding campers up.. seems I’m the only one who didn’t hear it until I was awoken.. So we packed up, and headed into Spokane to catch Willie Nelson at the Northern Quest Casino and Resort before I fly home Monday… Awesomeness.

On July 30, two epic concerts graced the west coast. One of them was LA Rising, which featured Rage Against the Machine, Muse, and Rise Against. The other was at the Gorge Amphitheater in George, Washington. The bands included Soundgarden, Queens of the Stone Age, Mastodon and Meat Puppets. Many other Concert Confessions writers were there that night, so here was one side to the same story. My dad and I got to the Gorge with little to no trouble. We didn’t get lost, there was no traffic, we got a good parking spot, and we arrived an hour and a half before doors opened. So with time to kill, we cranked up the Echo Movement and we chilled. At around 3:15 or so, a heavy metal looking dude with a nipple ring came up to us and asked us if we wanted to buy a shirt. I’d experienced this before, it was a bootleg. But it was cool and $20, so we bought it. I looked at the back where it showed all the bands, and saw a picture of Pearl Jam above the Queens of the Stone Age logo. Upon questioning the heavy metal looking dude, we found out that there was a rumor that Pearl Jam would play a few songs and that got me even more excited about the show.

Before going into the line, my dad had to get his wrist band so he could purchase alcohol, which is funny because I don’t think he drank at all that night. So we are in that line and it’s my dad’s turn and I am right behind him. My dad hands the dude his ID, and receives his wrist band. I wanted to have a little fun, so I said to the security guy, “I forgot my ID at home,” which got a laugh. We went to the real line at about 3:30 and we were towards the front of one of the lines. First, the VIP/Fan Club members were let in and then us regular people were let in. When we got inside, I bought a legal shirt and my dad bought a Queens of the Stone Age shirt. We bought some water to fill our Camelbak with, and we made our way to the amphitheater in hopes to find something to do for two hours until Meat Puppets came on. We sat in the shade, ate some mediocre food, and at about 5:30, we stood up in the crowd to wait for the Meat Puppets.

After a quick sound check, I immediately saw Curt Kirkwood arrive on stage, followed by the drummer (whatever his name is) and Curt’s brother Cris. They immediately broke into “Oh, Me” and they were jamming out. Curt didn’t sound great, but I wouldn’t expect him to since that song was written almost thirty years ago. Next was “Sam,” the song I was looking forward to most. If you don’t know the song, Curt and Cris both sing incredibly fast. Like 400 words a minute or something. And it’s great to see that they both still know the words and can sing them without any mistake.

Then they played “Plateau,” an odd song about nothing in particular, I think. After that, they played their biggest main stream hit “Backwater,” which sounded amazing. The Kirkwood brothers’ harmonies together sounded better than Tom DeLonge and Mark Hoppus by a mile. After that they played “Sloop John B,” a song originally written by the Beach Boys. Then they finished their too-short set with “Lake of Fire,” which, for some reason, induced a mosh pit. People are stupid when they are drunk. Meat Puppets finished their elongated jam version of “Lake of Fire,” and if there was anything I could’ve changed about the entire show, it would’ve been that Meat Puppets would’ve played longer. They were so great, and even at the ripe old age of 50-something, the Kirkwood brothers can still rock harder than Black Veil Brides ever will.

Sort of at the last minute, I decided that I didn’t care to see Mastodon. So my dad and I walked around, shared a funnel cake, and listened for the cue that Mastodon was done. When they finished playing “Blood and Thunder,” they left the stage and my dad and I went into the pit to wait for Queens of the Stone Age.

The roadies started setting up the back drop for Queens of the Stone Age, which was the detective notes for the assassination of JFK. Why they chose that, I will never know. Somewhere around 8:00, QOTSA came on stage. Josh Homme spoke in his lovely country accent, telling us how beautiful the Gorge was and how happy they were to open for Soundgarden. QOTSA broke into “You Think I Ain’t Worth a Dollar, But I’m a Millionaire,” which was a relatively short song. Afterwards they played “3’s and 7’s” and the hits just kept coming. They played songs like “Burn the Witch,” “Little Sister,” “Go With the Flow,” “No One Knows,” and “A Song for the Dead.”

The band sounded so great and the crowd was really into it. The problem was the two moshing idiots in front of me. One of them looked like the creepy dude in the Die Antwoord “Enter the Ninja” video.

When QOTSA left the stage, my dad decided he didn’t want to be in the pit during Soundgarden, so he left and went to the very back, while I stayed where I was. Some dude made his way through the crowd with his hand up to his mouth. He passed me and a few others, and then found out what happens when you drink a lot of alcohol.

After a sound check and some technical difficulties involving the images on the screen, we were ready to let the Sun set on the Gorge while Soundgarden jammed away. We heard some feedback and then what was certainly the opening bit of “Searching With My Good Eye Closed,” (This is my good eye; do you know a cow; a pig says; this is a rooster; the Devil says.) The band broke into that song and played it like it was nobody’s business. Chris Cornell sounded better than I expected him to. Ben Shepherd wandered the stage, made funny faces, and was a very entertaining performer. Matt Cameron banged the drums like a gun was being held to his head. And Kim Thayil looked like a gun was being held to his head if he didn’t reunite with Soundgarden. He had a smile on his face, but it didn’t seem like he was enjoying any part of it.

Soundgarden broke into hit after hit. They played “Spoonman,” “Blow Up the Outside World,” “The Day I Tried to Live,” “Superunknown,” “Slaves and Bulldozers,” “Black Hole Sun,” “Outshined,” “Rusty Cage,” and so many more that I can’t even remember. They even played some old songs like “Gun” and “Beyond the Wheel.”

I was in a lot of pain after the show, and my hopes that Pearl Jam would come out were crushed. No Pearl Jam. Just Matt Cameron. Not even Eddie Vedder would come out and play “Hunger Strike” with Soundgarden. It wouldn’t be much of a Temple of the Dog reunion since 5/6 of TOTD is Pearl Jam, but whatever. All in all, one of the best shows I have ever seen.

So I hope that Justito had a good time at the RATM show, because I definitely did. Unfortunately I didn’t run into any of my Concert Confessions peers, but I met a guy named Jeremy who saw Slightly Stoopid last weekend. That’s just as good, right?